Queensland’s new Energy Roadmap: Bringing Communities Along for the Energy Transition

The release of the new Queensland Energy Roadmap marks a significant step forward in the State’s pathway to building a long-term and diverse energy asset portfolio. It also highlights a persistent challenge: the gap between the scale of Queensland’s energy transformation and the readiness, expectations and lived experience of regional communities.

To bridge this divide, two questions must anchor Queensland’s energy transition:

1. What practical steps are needed to deliver the Queensland Energy Roadmap?

2. How do we ensure regional communities are genuinely included in, and benefit from, the transition?

A Disconnect Laid Bare

The scale and pace of Queensland’s renewable energy rollout has left many regional communities feeling overwhelmed. Major projects, corridor planning and infrastructure commitments have accelerated, yet engagement has not always kept pace with community expectations.

Reports from landholders receiving persistent, high-pressure approaches from developers have deepened concerns. With inconsistent transparency and no clear baseline engagement framework until recently, trust has been strained.

Queensland has decades of experience managing coexistence across mining, gas and agriculture. Mature systems, including policy, legislation, guidelines and organisations like Coexistence Queensland, provide structured pathways to balance land use pressures. Renewables, however, are only now entering that level of maturity.

A Turning Point for Renewables

This is why the Queensland Government’s recent planning and regulatory reforms, in particular mandatory Social Impact Assessments, Community Benefit Agreements, and the structured regional planning approach outlined in the new Queensland Energy Roadmap 2025, are so significant.

These changes aren’t simply procedural. They are about respect. They are about trust.

For renewable energy projects to succeed commercially, environmentally and socially, the people living closest to new infrastructure must be heard, involved and benefit meaningfully.

Bridging the Gap

The new energy roadmap provides a clearer structure for delivering Queensland’s targets, but it also reinforces a critical truth: decarbonisation will fail without social license and community confidence.

The recent reforms create an important foundation, but they are not a complete solution. Without thoughtful implementation - early engagement, transparent communication and genuine partnership - they risk becoming another administrative step rather than a behaviour shift.

What Might Good Look Like?

Practical pathways for bridging the gap between energy ambition and community experience include:

• Early, two-way engagement: Genuine dialogue that begins before formal consultation, giving communities real influence over project design

• Transparent and meaningful benefit sharing: Community Benefit Agreements that reflect local priorities, deliver real value and build long-term prosperity

• Capacity building for councils and community groups: Ensuring regional stakeholders have the knowledge, tools and resources to participate effectively

• Place-based planning: Recognising that each region, e.g., Darling Downs, Central Queensland, Far North Queensland, has different pressures, priorities and opportunities

• Long-term relationships: Moving beyond one-off engagement events to continuous, respectful communication throughout the project lifecycle and its operation and eventual decommissioning
  

A well-designed stakeholder engagement plan is central to achieving these outcomes. Without it, community interests cannot be properly understood, let alone managed.

Looking Ahead

As Queensland implements its Energy Roadmap 2025, the real test will be whether government and industry can embed genuine community partnership into the rollout - not as a checkbox, but as a core operating principle.

These reforms alone won’t fix everything. But they mark a meaningful shift: a recognition that net zero cannot be delivered at the cost of community confidence. The energy transition is not just a technical challenge; it is a social contract—and it only works when communities are at the table, heard and respected.

If you’re interested in how tailored engagement strategies and social impact planning can support your energy transition goals, get in touch.

Sarah Gooley is the Principal Social and Stakeholder Services Consultant for Epic Environmental. To learn more about how Epic can help your organisation - be it local government or developer - navigate these new planning requirements with effective stakeholder engagement planning and social impact baselining, assessment and management, reach out directly to Sarah.